Adapting to Space
by kate-dammit-run
Summary: With everyone else out of the garage, Walter and Paige spend some time alone. Just a small, light, angst free little thing.
1. Chapter 1

Hello! This is my first attempt at writing for Scorpion, so please be nice and I hope you enjoy it. This is set sometime around mid season 1 I suppose.

**Summary:** With everyone else out of the garage, Walter and Paige spend some time alone.

* * *

**Adapting to Space**

Paige walked into the garage and looked around. It was empty. Absolutely empty. She checked her watch. 8:30am. Usually, the garage was full at this time, with the geniuses already drowning into their individual projects. But not on this day. It was empty. Quiet. Strange, she thought, very very strange. She walked towards the kitchen and smiled. At least one thing wasn't off this morning. Coffee _with_ cinnamon. She poured herself some, held the warm mug in her palms for a moment and took a sip. Perfect. She closed her eyes and hummed.

"Good morning," Walter's voice startled her and she spun around quickly, the coffee mug in her shaking, threatening to spill, but Walter was quick to grab it, his hand covering hers to hold it steady.

And suddenly, the warmth of the coffee was replaced by a shiver across her spine. She gasped and pulled back.

"I'm… I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," Walter apologised, taking a step back.

Paige collected herself and shook her head, "No, no, you didn't. I just… I didn't know there was anyone here," she said. They stood in a slightly awkward silence for a moment before Paige spoke again, "where is everyone by the way?"

Walter turned around, looking at the empty space behind him. "Ahhh… Toby's car broke down when he was on his way to pick up Sylvester so he called happy to help him… Something like that," Walter explained, "it's a slow day anyway, we don't have any cases and all the paper work from last week is done," Walter rambled a bit longer, leaving the rest of the explanation to die.

"Well, a quiet slow day would be a welcome change," Paige said with a smile, "don't you think?"

Walter nodded, "Yes, I suppose."

"What do you have planned for today?" she asked, resting against the counter, planting her mug next to her.

Walter fidgeted in his place for a moment then took a step closer to her, keeping a good distance between them still. "I have some work to do on the rocket, so I thought I'd focus on that today," he said with a nod.

"Mind if I hang around?" she asked, "I mean, I have some paper work, administrative stuff Cabe needs from me, but I'd love… I'd love to watch you work while I finish it up."

Walter felt his throat tighten. What was happening? He swallowed against the lump and nodded, "ye-…yes, of course… no… no problem," he mumbled.

* * *

Paige looked up from her laptop and watched Walter work. There was something extremely fascinating about him when he worked. The focus, the commitment, the concentration, it was… fascinating. It was like watching all 197 of his genius at work, all his senses zoomed into fulfilling that one task. It was during this moment that she truly understood just how unique and special this human being was.

But she also saw how destructive it could be. It had been almost an hour and he had not stopped working for a single moment. And it got her thinking that this is how he would be if he were left alone. This is how Ralph would be. She was pretty sure he wouldn't stop to eat or drink or rest. He would just keep going and going and going until the task at hand was completed or he burned out, whichever came first.

She watched him for another few minutes, completely engrossed in this fascinating person. Eventually she cleared her throat, hoping that would get his attention without startling him.

She had to do it another two times before he noticed.

He turned to her and raised an eyebrow. "Everything ok?" he asked.

She smiled and nodded, "yeah, this paperwork isn't that exciting so… I thought… I thought I'd ask you what you were doing exactly," she said.

"Oh," he said, putting his tools away and brushing his fingers through his hair, "it's a competition… An anonymous billionaire is awarding $15 million for significant aerospace advancement and I… I'm…" he started to explain but she cut him off, "No, I know that part… what exactly are you doing? What's your approach… I know I've heard you guys talk about it before but it's a little bit too technical for me," she said, somewhat shyly. being around these geniuses all the time could get exhausting, constantly reminding them to use normal words when they go off on their long scientific monologues.

"Oh," Walter said, his voice barely a whisper. He knew what she was doing. he had felt her gaze on him as he worked. It was foreign for him. He was always so capable of submerging himself in his work, completely ignoring any and all external distractions, but somehow with her in the room with him, he just couldn't not feel her presence, her breath, the smell of her perfume, the soft way she hummed an sang while she worked, an unconscious thing that she did. He had felt her watching him and could hear the worry in her gaze. He knew what she was thinking, the same worry she often had for Ralph when he got too engrossed in a project.

He took a step towards her and stopped, taking a moment to think about it. "Ummm… Well… Humans have fared better in space travel than man-made machines, it's like… it's like humans want to be in space… it's as though in their engineering, there are parts that allow them to adjust to being in space. Machines on the other hand… they don't fare as well, at least… at least so far they have not reached the level of engineering that allows them to adapt. You see, we build these machines on Earth, and… and we try as best we can to simulate the conditions that they will face up there but we are still years away from perfecting the simulations. So my theory… actually… actually it was Toby's idea, is to create optimum conditions for the machinery we need to emulate the one thing we know that has had the best results in adapting to these conditions. Humans." He stopped talking suddenly and watched how she was watching him. A smile wide on her lips and something he did not recognise.

Admiration? Pride? Awe? He wouldn't know.

An uncontrollable blush rose on his cheeks. He shoved his hands in his pockets, looked at his feet and rocked back and forth, "I'm sorry, this… this must be extremely boring to you," he mumbled.

Paige shook her head and smiled. She pushed off the table she had been sitting on. She took one step towards him before she spoke. "Not boring. Not boring at all," she said and watched as his gaze slowly left the dull concrete by his feet and met hers, "this is actually… fascinating."

He smiled. "Really?" Fascinating was the last thing he expected to hear.

"Yes," she said, her voice cracking as she took another step towards him.

"It's just that… it's just that people usually find this stuff boring… dry…" he countered.

She shook her head, "that's just because people don't bother to try to understand this… to understand you… all of you," she whispered, "nothing you guys do is boring. In the last few months, everything I've seen at Scorpion has been absolutely… fascinating."

She smiled and looked away, suddenly, holding his gaze became hard… scary.

After a moment, she cleared her throat again, turning around towards the kitchen. She looked at him over her shoulder and asked, "I'm going to get some coffee, would you like some?"

* * *

So what do you think? I'd love to hear your opinions on this because I may have a chapter 2 for it if anyone is interested.


	2. Chapter 2

I just want to say thank you so much to everyone who read and everyone who took the time to leave a review. I definitely wasn't expecting that much. Honestly. So as promised here's chapter 2. This'll have the rest of the gang making an appearance as well. Hope you enjoy it!

* * *

She had managed to convince him to sit down and have their coffee, instead of drinking it while he worked. Normal people pace their work, they take breaks, she had told him and then giggled when he retorted with a confused look and a "but that's so inefficient." She had pulled out a chair and set his much on the table and said, "what an I say? Us normals aren't efficient."

Small talk. He knew about it but never saw the need or purpose for it. It was a waste of time. It advanced nothing and served no greater goal. And yet there he was, sitting down drinking coffee at 11am and listening as Paige told him about her classmates at her night courses. It was absolutely useless. He didn't know any of these people, and from what she had told him, none of them seemed like people he would want to meet. And yet, he was sitting there and listening. And he was… enjoying it. Not necessarily it, but he was not as annoyed by the whole thing as he thought he would be. He was enjoying… something. He wouldn't know it being him, but someday he might understand that was he was enjoying was her company, just sitting there, watching how excited she got as she spoke, the way her eyes twinkled or her nose crunched as she spoke. But for now, Walter could only describe it as… he was content.

Paige sat back and took a long sip. She put the cup down and looked at him. He knew about this too. Small talk was usually a two way street. Was she expecting him to start talking about something? Like what? The weather? Traffic? He was stumped. He didn't do small talk. But there she was, watching him, waiting.

It took him a moment or two and then he thought of something. He was her employer after all. And… maybe this would work. "So… ummm… Paige, are you happy?" he asked. Employers often asked their employees about how they felt at their jobs, didn't they?

Paige's eyebrows raised in question. "I'm sorry?" She asked, not entirely sure what he meant. Was she happy now? Or just in general?

Walter scratched his forehead. This was harder than he thought. "Here… at Scorpion, I mean. Are you happy at this job?" he asked. She had been a waitress and her job now was a drastic change. It was a legitimate question, right? Working at Scorpion wasn't a typical job, he knew that, especially for a person like Paige. Toby, Happy, Sylvester and himself belonged at Scorpion because they didn't fit anywhere else. But Paige she could easily be at any other normal job; a job where people worked nine to five, sat at desks, took coffee breaks and lunch breaks, chatted around the water cooler. Everything that Scorpion wasn't. And he was genuinely concerned about how she felt being at Scorpion, as unorthodox of a workplace as it was.

Paige smiled, "Yes, I'm happy. It's done wonders… You guys have done wonders for me and Ralph. We would have never been at where we are are now if it weren't for Scorpion. My son is happy. I'm happy," she said.

Walter nodded and looked at her. And she knew he was now analysing her answer. Of course he was. It wasn't the reply he was expecting. He wasn't a parent but he knew parents often connected their happiness with that of their child. he found it interesting but i wasn't really his domain. That was where Toby came in. It should have been a fair enough answer but for some reason Walter wanted more. He wanted to know if she, Paige, was happy.

He wanted to know if Scorpion was making her happy, if being around them, with them was making her happy.

And if it wasn't, he wanted to know what he could do to make her happy.

Suddenly, Paige's happiness was all that mattered.

"I… I know that working at Scorpion… that working with us can be challenging… can be somewhat exacerbating. We're not the easiest people to be around and the job isn't exactly what you'd find in the wanted ads," Walter said, running his fingers through his hair, "so I just - "

Before he could finish, the garage door swung open and a very sweaty, very annoyed Happy stormed in, closely followed by Toby and Sylvester. "Well, now I am 100% sure that Harvard will accept just about anyone," she turned and glared at Toby, "since they accepted and idiot like you."

Happy marched to her workstation and slammed her tool set down.

Paige and Walter looked at each other for a moment and then got up and joined the others.

"What's going on?" Paige asked, "what happened to you guys?"

Sylvester squeezed some hand gel into his palms and said, "don't, trust me you don't want to go there. I've been listening to this for over and hour and I think I have a migraine."

Toby smiled and waved his hand, "Oh it was nothing," he said, "just some car trouble that Happy so graciously took care of."

"Car trouble?" Happy fumed, "that wasn't car trouble. That was Toby being an idiot, again!"

"Can someone please explain what happened? Using words and sentences that are informative?" Paige said, crossing her arms. Walter stood beside her, his face a mixture of confusion and amusement.

"I'll tell you what happened," Happy said, wiping grease off her hands, "the Harvard trained doctor over here calls me at 8am and says his car has suddenly stopped running. So I go to help him out because I've been told friends help each other out," she drops the now dirty cloth on the table and hops up to sit. "And I spend the next two hours taking apart every single part of his piece of junk -"

"Hey! Be nice! I love that car!" Toby jumped up in defence of his car.

"Car? That's not a car. That's a junk yard reject!" Happy said, "anyway, I spend two hours elbow deep in grease and there's nothing wrong with the car!"

"So, why did it stop running?" Walter asked, his crossed arms mirroring Paige's.

"Because it ran out of gas!" Sylvester said.

"And neither of you three geniuses knows how to read the gas meter?" Paige asked.

"Ah, here's the best part of the story," Happy said, "and I'll let doctor idiot explain that to you because I cant promise to keep it PG."

Toby got up and stepped forward, his hands already raised in a defensive pose. "Ok, so here's the thing. The needle on the gas meter stopped working a few months ago. So what I did was, I wrote an app for my phone that syncs with my credit card. So every time I use my card to buy gas, the app updates and then it calculates the distance I travel and lets me know when I should refuel," Toby explained.

"That's actually pretty ingenious," Walter said, genuinely impressed.

"But last week, I accidentally dropped my phone into a frying pan and… well, you know where this is going," Toby said.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Paige said, "let me get this straight. So a small thing in your car stops working and instead of just fixing it you… you did all that?"

Toby shrugged and Happy hopped off the table, heading towards the toilet, smacking him on the back of his head as she passed by him.

"See? What did I tell you? He's an idiot," happy said as she walked past Paige.

Paige laughed and turned to Walter as the others each went to their own workstation.

"Walter?" she said and watched as he turned towards her, "I wouldn't change this job for anything."

She smiled and tentatively put her hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently before quickly pulling back and going back to her work.

Walter smiled. He knew she meant it. And that she was happy. And he knew that was something he wanted, for Paige to be happy.

And he made himself a promise that he will always make sure that Paige is always happy.


End file.
